


The Wayfarers

by littleoptimistme



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Aliens, Alternate Universe - Reverse Portal (Gravity Falls), Angst, Dimension hoping, Gen, Guardians of the Galaxy - Freeform, Space Adventure!, Space Bounty Hunter, Space Opera, Stan is abducted after hes kicked out, The axolotl, and becomes a, cipher and the nightmares, kind of, multidimensions, scifi, stan may or may not know bill, tale of two stans, the plotline is guardians of the galaxy inspired
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-14
Updated: 2021-02-03
Packaged: 2021-03-18 16:46:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28746414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleoptimistme/pseuds/littleoptimistme
Summary: Stan is thrown through a multi-dimensional portal right after he’s kicked out, and it wouldn't have been a big deal, but SOMEBODY had to go and build an unstable portal in their basement ten years down the line.(a space adventure very much inspired by guardians of the galaxy)
Relationships: Bill Cipher & Stan Pines, Ford Pines & Mabel Pines, Ford Pines & Stan Pines, Mabel Pines & Stan Pines
Comments: 33
Kudos: 97





	1. Mr. Blue Sky

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! So, this is going to follow vaguely the plot of the guardians of the galaxy, at least in theory, but it's not exactly a crossover or anything. We'll see if I can stay on track. I'm... very excited about this project. Have fun!

The dream started with the flickering gleam of the television set and the _pop, pop, pop_ of a ball and paddle, and at first, this made up the extent of Stan’s awareness. Flickering, white light, and _pop, pop, pop_ , over and over. His eyes adjusted. The rough couch fabric dug into his shoulder. It was late, late enough that Stan should be sleeping, but Stan promised Ford he’d wait up. Ma had been struggling to put his baby brother to sleep for an hour, and Pa probably sat in his office. Stan didn’t really know. He couldn’t see what was on TV, but it was loud, and he was alone in their tiny living room. Technically, he wasn’t allowed to have his feet on the couch, but, counterpoint, his feet were dangling over the _top_ of the sofa, not _on_ the sofa, so he wasn’t breaking the rule. Technically.

When the front door opened, he pushed himself up on an elbow. Ford? It must be. What took him so long? The fair should have ended hours ago. He heard Ford shift off his coat and set a chain of jingling keys onto their hook by the door. His steps were slow. When he rounded the corner, Stanley’s heart sank into his gut.

It all happened so fast after that, a horrible blur of shouting and rough hands. Ford had to know he was telling the truth! It was an accident! Then his father leaned over him, lifting him off the floor, screaming about what a failure he was, what a pathetic excuse of a son he’d turned out to be. The concrete outside scraped the palms of his hands when he landed on the sidewalk. He used to send sticks and leaves down the wet gutter just here. They used to draw monsters out of chalk. _Oh, you did it this time..._

Rage rushed through him, hot and heavy and much more comfortable than feeling anything else. He screamed at them, threw himself into the driver’s seat of his car… and then he woke up.

It had been a dream. A horrible, ridiculous dream. Stanley had let out a sigh of relief and checked the alarm clock. Seven AM. He could hear Ford bustling in the bathroom down the hall, probably already dressed. Grey light shined through their bedroom window, revealing yet another dreary, overcast day. It was the second-to-last day of school—the day of the science fair. Stan didn’t think he’d go to school today. He threw off the covers, and the dream faded to the back of his mind. It wasn’t necessary.

Or it shouldn’t have been.

But ten hours later, Stan stood on the sidewalk. His mother’s red neon window sign gleamed in his father’s glasses, and the palms of Stan’s hands pulsed with each heartbeat. He felt like someone had torn out one of his lungs. He gaped in horror and disbelief, and the force of the door slammed in his face, shook him back. He clung to the overnight bag his father had materialized, seemingly out of nowhere. _How long ago did he pack this?_

“Stanford, tell him he’s bein’ crazy!” His voice cracked in a way it hadn’t in years. There was Ford at the window, _just like the dream._ It made Stan dizzy. He mentally pleaded with Stanford to race away from the window and join him out here, to tell Pa to calm down, to _put up his hand at least._

Stanford closed the curtains. The _bastard!_ How could he do this to him? His father’s anger cut him, but Ford’s was worse. It was like being shot.

He didn’t shout as he did in the dream. Stan wasn’t angry this time. He backed up a step, shuffled another, his shoes scraping on the gravel. His hands stung, and his neck hurt where Filbrick grabbed his shirt. His hand found the door handle, and he fumbled inside. Later, Stan wouldn’t remember turning on the car. He wouldn’t remember driving down the alley or even passing the beach. He squeezed the wheel until his knuckles were white, and his hands trembled, and his vision swam with tears. Just outside of the city, he parked near a dingy gas-and-go with flickering orange streetlights. “ _Just wake up,”_ he hissed. “ _Wake up, dang it!”_ Of course, it was futile. Stan knew this. It made little sense. What? Had the universe just decided to mock him? Warn him about the worst night of his life without letting him do anything about it? What kind of sick crap was this? He wiped his eyes with his sleeves. No, he wasn’t _crying._ When he looked up, there was… a white dog. Stan blinked at it. It sat in the light of the gas station, head cocked and eyes on Stan. It wasn’t particularly unusual- probably a Pitbull-lab mutt, but something about it struck Stan as odd. Where did it come from? He forced his breathing to slow. The shaking was worse now, but it was easier just to let it happen then try to make himself stop. He needed to think. He needed a plan. As he calmed, the dog stood and walked into the forest. Stan watched it go.

He eased back onto the road and took a mental tally of the supplies he had in his car. The overnight bag, probably filled with clothes. He had his metal detector in the back. He had some cash in the center council he kept for gas. There was a blanket in the trunk, wasn’t there?

Detachedly considering just how royally screwed he was, Stan drove down a dark, empty road lined by trees. He wasn’t sure where he was going, but he had to get away. His ever-disapproving father’s face swam behind his eyelids. Was staying in Glass Shard beach worth the risk of running into Pa again? Stan didn’t think so.

In dimension 46, in fact, in hundreds of other similar dimensions, Stan drove until he reached the next beachside city, and then he slept in the backseat until morning. In this one, a gaping hole lined by shocks of blue electricity opened up ten feet from Stan’s car, curling the world away like stage curtains. Stan didn’t even have a chance to scream before the hole swallowed him entirely. His car disappeared into the darkness, and the rip closed soundlessly as if nothing had happened at all, leaving an empty road and not a single witness to the hasty abduction.

So Stanley Pines, age seventeen, left dimension 47.

* * *

**Ten Years Later:**

Stan (aka Alcatraz Shanklin) was having a grand ol’ time. The radio volume was loud, and you could hardly hear the roar of the engines. He’d just finished his fourth cup of coffee, and _oh yes,_ he was ready!

He flew the Stanmobile low over the landscape. It wasn’t a pleasant place, admittedly. More of a bog than he’d expected, but there was a breathable atmosphere. Quite the treat! If anyone ever occupied it, it hadn’t been in years, centuries, possibly. He caught glimpses of ivy infested building corners, stone arches, some rusting metal, all of it slowly sinking in a greenish-brown muck. The rays of the sun just barely pierced the cloud layer, leaving everything dull, misty, and smelling distinctly of rot. Yeah, again, like he said, not a pleasant place. He drummed his gloved hands on the wheel and checked the coordinates on his screen yet again. The reason he’d taken this delightful day trip was supposed to be five minutes from here, somewhere within a two hundred foot radius. Two hundred feet was quite a large area, but he could handle it.

Stan flicked his glasses down, a pair of goggles which revealed, in blue blinking holographic arrows, that his destination was in sight. Good. He didn’t want to deal with getting lost. In and out. An easy extraction. He promised that Zeawrthn chick he’d be back with breakfast, and he was getting hungry, to be honest.

Stan cruised toward a lonely stone plateau crowned with ruins stained green. His glasses measured the decrepit remains and built him a guess at the building as it used to be. It used to be a rather impressive castle, or maybe a cathedral. It was difficult to tell. It soared upward in grand arches, stained glass, and turrets. Or rather, it _had._ Now it was nothing but a jumbled pile of rocks. Stan landed at the edge of the island and clicked off the engine. The radio cut off, leaving Stan in startling silence. The mist was chilly and thick outside. He hopped onto the wet stone, only to slip and catch himself on the Stanmobile with a yelp. He… should have expected that. His boots were metal-tipped and outfitted with various knick-knacks (he was currently working on supplies for little rockets on the sides), but he needed to fix this traction issue. Stan cursed under his breath. Why couldn’t people hide things in warm, dry places? Like a beach. A fourteen-star hotel. He’d even take Lottocron Nine… Grumbling to himself, Stan straightened his jacket and patted the Stanmobile apologetically. The car was only vaguely car-like at this point, sporting retractable, gleaming, white wings, jets, airtight seals, and a harpoon gun thicker than Stan’s leg on the roof. It was _very cool._ Oh, he had one of those bobbling hula dancers on the dashboard too. It completed the whole thing.

He clicked the button on the side of his glasses and took out a gun, just in case, though there wasn’t anyone for miles, as far as he could see. The goggles continued to display a holograph of the old cathedral/castle/temple? He walked past looming walls, beneath broken archways, and around puddles. The windows had long since been blown out, but if the piles of colorful glass were any sign, they used to hold vast stained glass scenes.

There was a brief scare when he discovered a multitude of crab-like creatures scuttling in the puddles. They gnashed needle-like teeth at him. Intimidating, in theory. Stan hummed the song on the radio as he punted the things through the stone arches. He kicked one, and it hit another, and they both went sailing. Double-shot!

Upon reaching what appeared to be the main room, coated in ivy and dirt, Stan turned in a slow circle. There was a set of stairs to the left of a channel of lilypad coated water. Upon the stage, an empty bowl sat on a pedestal. He checked his watch and flicked his wrist. An antenna unfolded, and Stan waved carefully around the room, watching the numbers.

As he expected, the target was near the stage. Stan took the stairs two at a time and stopped at the top. The bowl was a white, stained stone. Empty, but for a good accumulation of rainwater and algae. There didn’t appear to be anything else here. He glanced at the watch again, gave it a shake, and then chewed his lip. Okay, so it was somewhere around here.

A familiar voice echoed in his memory, _Always check the most obvious place. People are stupid, Stanley. If you were going to hide something very quickly, where would you hide it?_

It was decent advice, and it had served him well countless times. Sometimes you just needed to get out of your own way and use common sense. Stan looked over the stage again. The rain made little pitter-pats in the distance. There was nothing but smooth stone, the crumbling dome above him, and the pedestal. It had to be in the pedestal somehow. He felt around the bottom of the bowl and then down the pedestal. At the bottom, his finger met a small indentation. Stan pushed, and the thing clicked. _Bingo._

A stone grated, shockingly loud sound in the silence, and he shot up. To the pedestal’s right, a flat slab of stone pulled back, revealing a square hole large enough for a single person. Shining a light inside, Stanley saw several things. He saw the tattered remains of a tunic sitting in dry sand. He saw what was _undoubtedly_ the skull of a species unknown to Stanley, and he saw a skeleton hand, holding what could only be the target. Stanley eased himself down, but even moving slowly, the dust swirled in the air, and Stanley coughed and hacked and rubbed his eyes. “Aw, jeez, uck.”

It would be easy just to reach down and grab it, but Stan’s instructions had been clear. It would be _very bad_ for him if he touched it. As planned, Stan reached deep into his pocket and pulled out a black box, a little larger than his fist. It opened up like a ring box, and there was a perfect indentation inside for the object. Crouching, Stan squinted at the thing. The skeleton held a tiny hourglass wreathed in black metal leaves with gold veins. It would have fit in Stan’s palm easily. It was a beautiful piece and incredibly intricate for its size. Black sand sat inside the hourglass, and it glowed a dull green. Stan huffed. Four-hundred-thousand credits for _this_? He knew looks could deceive, but still. Gentle, Stan nudged the hourglass into the box and shut it with a click. The mechanisms in the box whirled and clicked. It would be safe there. You had to know exactly where to push on the box if you wanted to open it. Smiling, Stan straightened. Going off the wall, he hoped out of the hole (the lower gravity here helped).

That’s when he heard the laser gun power-up.

Stan slowly swung around, the box tight to his chest. “Gentlemen!” He counted five of them in a loose circle blocking him from the stairs. “I didn’t know this was such a busy spot!”

The men were of various species, ranging from the black and orange speckled people of D-8/I, several other humanoids to the hulking, yeti-like creatures of D-68. They wore black robes, tunics, and boots. Black, featureless glass masks covered their heads. They held laser guns- big, shiny, will-definitely-cook-you-on-the-spot ones- from D-34564. “Drop the box!” ordered the guy at the front. “That is the property of High Priest Urian and the temple of Quetzalcoatl.”

Two creatures, both at least two heads taller than Stan, grabbed Stanley, jostling him away from the hole. Stanley let his eyes go wide.

“Okay, _okay!_ There! Have it! Please don’t shoot me. I don’t want any trouble. I’m just a scientist, dang.” He dropped the box, and the guy who spoke grabbed it before it could even reach the ground.

“Who are you?”

“I’m a scientist! Archaeologist, specifically, though I dabble in crab watching. It’s like bird watching, but with cra-” Another laser powered up, the gleaming red lights aimed right at his face. “Okay! You’ve got me. I’m a bounty hunter. _Alcatraz Shanklin_.” Stan waited, an eyebrow raised.

The guy frowned. “And?”

“Aw, come on. Really? I’m like a _big de-_ ” Mid-sentence, Stan kicked, smacking the guy’s gun out of his hand. The guy looked shocked, but that was about all. Stan swung to the left, elbowed the tall man in the nose, caught his gun as it fell, spun a kick at another man, took out his own gun, and then _Bam Bam Bam Bam Bam!_

Stan panted and glanced at his watch. All five of them wavered and then fell simultaneously onto the wet stone with a _slap_. Six and a half seconds. He was getting lax.

Stan plucked the box from the ground, tossed it into the air, and then pocketed it. He jogged down the stairs.

Course, it couldn’t have just ended there, could it? Not with Stan’s luck. The moment he rounded a corner, he was met with a flurry of black-robed figures. They let out shouts of alarm, and Stan darted down the open-roof hall, shooting blindly. If he could get to his pocket… Ah! His fingers closed around a few metal balls, and he threw them behind him as he ran. The people, whoever the heck they were, we’re hovering around the island, parking their big boy spaceships around the cathedral. He could see the edge over the wall. Adrenaline coursed through Stan, and he grinned. He let loose the balls from his pockets and then practically flew forward. They let out shrill screams and erupted into red smoke. The explosion jolted the ground beneath him, and he vaulted off the rubble. They chased, but he’d surprised them and had the advantage. Ha! He skidded down the stone, past the ruins, and through what might have been the front door originally. His heart pounded in his chest. With the click of a button on his watch, the Stanmobile door eased open, the engines roared to life, and Stanley let out a whoop as he let himself halfway jump/slide/fall _right_ into the driver’s seat. He slammed shut the door, turned the key, and the radio blared. The ground fell away. And just in time, too. Robe-dudes were finally getting on the ball, apparently. They shot up at the bottom of the car and then got into their skippers. The cruiser-sized spaceship came to life and turned guns bigger than Stan’s entire ship on him.

“Finders keepers, ya chumps!” Stan shouted out the window. A laser shot past his head, and he yelped. Probably best not to do that... He floored it. The Stanmobile shot away, whizzing past decrepit trees, mist, and massive bubbles of gunk. He zig-zagged close to the marsh, eye on the rearview mirror. Crap! They were still on him. The robed dudes had sleek skippers, oblong black glass, completely featureless.

Stan pressed the autopilot button on the screen, and then he cranked down the window. He sent a few shots back. He caught the windshield of one, but it didn’t seem to slow it down, and then Stan had to duck beneath a moss-covered tree limb, barely avoiding decapitation. Spinning forward in the seat, he jerked the wheel upward just as the marsh dropped over a cliff in a slow, sludge-filled waterfall. Stan zoomed into the cloud cover. He couldn’t see anything up here but white. This was a terrible idea! The wind roared, but he didn’t dare close the window.

It was time to skedaddle. Stan fiddled with the buttons, and the Stanmobile grumbled, its mechanics warming. He could hear guns going off behind him, sparks of light, but he couldn’t see how close they were! Then again, they also couldn’t see him.

The Stanmobile stuttered. She didn’t like using this much power at once. “C’mon, baby. One jump. Just need one good jump…” He fumbled in the coordinates, finalizing the sequence just as a black skipper materialized from the fog directly to his left. Swearing, Stan shot out the window.

 **PORTAL INITIAlIZING.** The computer announced.

“About time!” He shot again. This time the laser made a hole in the windshield. The skipper slammed into Stan’s side, sending Stan’s gun to the floor.

“ANY SECOND NOW!”

**PORTAL… ACTIVATED.**

A massive weight flew from Stan’s ship. A bolt of blue light opened into a ten-by-ten foot portal of swirling light about a hundred feet away. Here was the thing about portals: they couldn’t stay open long. With enough power, someone might keep a portal functioning for… a month? And that was only if they didn’t use it consistently. Any more than a few minutes of an open portal between dimensions, and you risked tearing reality. The Stanmobile had enough power to open a portal for ten seconds. It was a good thing Stan was going so fast then, wasn’t it? Stan’s mind raced. He needed to hit it at an angle so the skipper couldn’t follow. He counted under his breath. _Three, two- NOW!_ He yanked the wheel to the side, and the car shrieked, shifting the back end to the right. The skipper slammed into the side. And then, with a rush of nauseating energy, familiar but unpleasant, the Stanmobile flew through the portal. It shut immediately behind him.

Everything went white.

Stan spun around and around, crashing and tumbling. He struggled for control, and _finally,_ the Stanmobile came to a stop, dropping Stan harshly into his seat.

The only thing moving was Stan’s dashboard hula dancer. The car steamed. 

For a long moment, Stan couldn’t move. He breathed, hacked, coughed, and kept breathing. He chuckled and then laughed out loud and then winced. He’d bruised his ribs somehow in the crash. Gosh, that was a little too close for comfort. Who _were_ those guys? How did they get there so fast?

Stan tried the door handle, and when that didn’t work, kicked the door open. He eased out, leaning heavily on the door, and looked over the ship. It was steaming under the hood, but thank goodness, the wings retracted in time. That was what Stan was most worried about. The car itself was filthy, a little scratched and dented, but it had seen worse. The more robust metal he’d used to reinforce it was doing its job. Stan coughed and then squinted out at the sunny world he’d landed in. He appeared to be in the backyard of an aristocratic mansion, next to a beautiful lilypad pond. His car/ship had rent a massive gash down the sloping lawn. Up at the top of the hill, half a dozen well-dressed women with green skin and dainty white umbrellas sat at a small table near the mansion. Everything appeared to be in order.

Stan waved at them with a grin. “Back again, ladies! So we have some bad news! I didn’t have time to get breakfast from D-568, and now my car is too overheated to make another trip for now. _Good news,_ though!” He gestured up at the table. They’d covered it in black and blue fruit. “It looks like you figured it out yourselves!”

A lady dropped her teacup.

* * *


	2. Fox on the Run

He didn’t intend to stay in Dimension 59/I\Q2 very long, but the sisters were so nice and had extra food. Their hot tub was legendary. He’d dragged his car up to the road with the help of some of the servants, and after a cursory look, determined that any damage was purely ornamental. He’d fix that later. Now, it just needed to charge. Before he knew it, the sun sank behind rolling green hills, and Stan was having a great time recounting (slightly embellished) tales of his adventures in the multiverse around a roaring fireplace inside the sitting room. The girls sat in a semicircle on couches, listening intently. Or rather, most of them. It was getting late, and the purple-skinned girl to his left was beginning to nod off. Stan didn’t mind. He was getting tired himself.

“... and so they banned me from Lottocron Nine after that. It’s a real shame. I left my other eye there.”

One of the women cocked her head. “Your… eye?”

“Oh, yeah. I had to get a whole new one. This one here.” He gently pulled down his bottom lid and winked. He couldn’t see it, obviously, but he knew it made the electronics flash blue for a second. It had the desired effect. The women’s mouths fell open in morbid curiosity.

“A bionic eye! And you can _see_ out of that?”

“Yep. Better than before, actually. I’m real short-sighted.” He could see it on their faces that they _desperately_ wanted to ask what had happened, but that wasn’t a story Stan wanted to dredge up. It was a bit of a downer. To summarize: sharp object across the face and an impressive scar diagonally through his eyebrow, over his eye, and trailing onto his cheek. It was an occupational hazard when you worked with the sorts of people he’d worked with. Stan was just beginning to think he might have been here too long when suddenly the sleepy purple girl (Lacy?) sat up ram-rod straight.

“Speak of the devil,” Stan muttered.

“Lacy?” said one of the women. “What’s wrong?”

Lacy’s eyes flew open, revealing slitted yellow eyes. As usual, no one noticed but Stan. You had to sort of blur your eyes a bit, like one of those hidden 3D picture books. Lacy smiled, perhaps a little too hard, and grabbed Stan’s wrist. “I am perfectly dandy, sister dear!”

Stan resisted the urge to roll his eyes and instead shook Lacy’s hand off. He stood. “You’ll have to excuse me, girls. I’ll be right back.” Without further explanation, Stan grabbed his red jacket off the back of the couch and strode away from the fireplace. Outside the sitting room, the hallway was dark, cold, and lined with portraits. The moonlight slid glowing blue rectangles down the hall. Stan leaned up against a wall and considered whether or not it was worth it to try and run.

Before he’d made his decision, ‘Lacy’ slunk into the hallway, shutting the door behind her. Her eyes gleamed as she stomped up to him. “Quick, did you get it? She’s going to wake up any minute.”

Stan crossed his arms. “What is this, Bill? Some kind of treat? Two visits in a week. I haven't seen you this much in two years.”

Bill huffed. “I’ve been-”

“Busy, yeah, I know. You said.” He glared steadily at Bill. There wasn’t a way around this. Stan cleared his throat. “Yeah, I got it. It’s in my bag.”

Bill grinned. “Ha! I knew it- knew my favorite Pines would come through.”

“Uh-huh. There were some other goons after it too. Guys in black robes. Claimed it belonged to their Pretzel god or somethin’.”

“I’ve never heard of a Pretzel god. Hamburger god, yes. Carnival food in general, yes, but pretzel- the point is, if _I_ don’t know about it, it’s not important or real, and you should give the hourglass to me right now!”

“I can’t just hop over to the Nightmare dimension! I nearly short-circuited the car getting away.”

Bill blew a raspberry. “You and I both know you don’t need the car!”

“Aw, well,” Stan glanced at his watch. “Turns out there is _quite_ the market for this do-dad.” He couldn’t help the smile beginning to form on his lips as Bill’s face dropped. “Oops, looks like Lacy’s waking up soon.”

Bill sputtered. “Don’t _make_ me put a bounty on you! We have a deal, kid! If you don’t get back home-” Bill’s eyes flickered in and out. He jabbed Stan in the chest. “So help me gods, I will tear you limb from limb like I should have back in ‘69! Stanley, I am _not joke-_ ”

Lacy’s eyes suddenly flashed bright yellow and then faded to their normal brown. She wavered dizzily, and Stan caught her elbow. She squinted. “W-where- how did I get-?”

“It’s alright,” Stan said. Per usual, Cipher ruined the mood. “I think you were sleepwalking. Just go back to bed, doll.”

Lacy nodded, obviously still addled with sleep. As she tottered away, Stan wondered idly what Bill promised her in her dreams. The moment she rounded a corner, Stan’s pleasant smile disappeared. He scowled and shouldered on his jacket. He needed the get out of here. 

If Stan wanted to pull this off, he’d have to move fast. He found his car at the front of the house where he left it. A twelve-foot tall butler gave him a confused look, and Stan slapped him on the shoulder (or, mid-back, considering). “Tell the girls thanks for the tiny hot dogs. Absolutely superb.” He flicked his wrist to unlock the car and then slid inside.

“Sir-”

“It takes real talent to get that sauce right. Not too sweet, a little spicy… Ah, look at that, all charged up!” He turned the key, and the car sputtered to life, the lights blinking blue.

The butler folded his skinny frame down so he could see Stan. “Are you quite certain? The Madame is more than willing to host for the night.”

Stan grinned. “I ‘preciate it, but something’s come up. Ciao!”

He thundered down the gravel driveway, spitting dust into the air behind him, and headed into the dark countryside. The car rumbled beneath him, but she ran just fine, so that was good.

His best bet for a buyer would be on Lottocron Nine, but he’d have to be stealthy there (again, since he wasn’t supposed to be there at all), and he needed to be _fast._ So, dimension 8-BFD it was. He trusted the manager there anyway. He’d sold them stuff before, and they’d always come through honestly. Stan thumbed in the coordinates and tapped at the loading bar with a frown. Okay, maybe the car wasn’t quite back in peak condition. He’d have to check that out soon as he had a moment to rest. It was gonna take a few minutes to charge up a portal. 

Sighing, Stan put the car on autopilot and considered his bag in the passenger seat. The little box peaked out from a pile of clothes, knives, food packets, half a dozen ID cards, a water bottle, and some snack wrappers. What was it about this thing that had Bill so fired up? Not just Bill. There were those monk people and weren’t the only ones. People all over the Ethernet were looking for the hourglass. Stan picked the box up and turned it in his hand. He probably shouldn’t open it. 

His finger found the secret tab, and the box popped open. The black sand glowed green, illuminating the car, and Stan frowned. Was it the sand? It didn’t look like cosmic sand, which was the only ‘sand’ people cared to pay this much money for. So what was it?

He’d just popped it shut when a very familiar sensation tugged his chest. He froze. “You’re kidding me- _Now?_ ” The loading bar was barely past seventy percent. The tug sort of felt like a string, deep in his lungs, slowly pulling tighter and tighter. It itched like heck, and Stan’s heart hammered. He was slipping. Stan thrust the hourglass into his pocket and reached for his pack, but his hand fell through nothing as the world erupted into white light. _Crapcrapcrap!_ Stan flew forward, carried with the car's momentum, and crashed in a tumbling ball of flailing limbs.

This always happened at the worst times! The car had to be dimensions away now. 

He groaned and got onto his knees. It was _loud_ here, wherever here was. An alarm, or maybe several, wailed, and someone shouted over rushing wind and rumbling thunder. The stone floor was cold and gritty beneath him. He blinked a few times to settle the fussy conglomeration of black blobs and whirling white and blue light, and he tried to catch his breath. The slip must have short-circuited his left eye. He could only see out of the right. At least it didn’t seem like he would throw up this time...

Stan used the rock wall to get to his feet. He swayed unsteadily. ‘Here’ appeared to be a large cave or some kind of underground bunker. Computers lined a closed-off room on the opposite side of Stan, and a _massive_ portal stood in the center of the room. It sent off sparks of electricity in its runaway spiral, and a tremendous burst shot into the ceiling, sending rocks raining down on them.

Yes, _them_. There was someone else in this room. Cursing, Stan jogged around the portal, a hand up to shield his face from the light. The wind whipped his hair and clothes. He could just barely make out the frantic motions of someone at the base of the portal. They had a panel open. Stars, what kind of idiot tried to make a _permanent_ portal! No wonder it was going haywire. He needed to get out of here immediately before the whole dimension turned inside out _._ “HEY!” he shouted.

The guy didn’t seem to hear him.

“Hey, stop! Stop, you’re gonna make it worse!” Stan checked his watch, flicking through the settings, only to squint at the numbers on the screen. Did he see that right?

Dimension 47. Who would have thought...

Stanley jogged forward, which was difficult enough with the wind, his skewed sense of three-dimensional space, and what he was beginning to suspect were gravitational anomalies. “Guy in the coat!” It was too bright, and Stan’s vision was still too blurry to see clearly, but he scrambled up the stairs. “What are you doing?”

The man jerked back in shock. “Where- how did you-?”

“Forget about it!” Stan shouted. “You’ve got minutes before this thing goes supernova! You’ve gotta shut it down!”

“I can’t!” the man shouted in reply. “I’m trying, but there’s too much energy!” He grabbed his head. “I _knew_ I should have dismantled it. I should have- I thought I had more time!” Something about the guy was giving Stan a weird feeling. But… what would be the chances? He squinted at him, but his face was a vague blob wearing glasses. Maybe if Stan got _right up_ in his personal space… Stan wasn’t going to do that.

There wasn’t time to think about it. He needed a solution _now._ If it couldn’t turn off, then there was only one option. He grabbed the guy’s arm and pulled him away from the panel. He pressed his watch against the computer, and the lights blinked, accepting the coordinates. It didn’t seem possible, but the portal roared louder. The earth shook, and a piece of stone larger than Stan’s car came crashing down in front of the portal. The guy clung to his arm in terror. “Let’s go!” Stan shouted, pulling the both of them up the steps. The portal’s gravity was already pulling him closer.

“Go? _In there?”_ The man tried to jump away, but Stan grabbed the scruff of his coat. He dragged the man to the top step. “Listen- _Listen_ to me! The energy has to go somewhere, and if it doesn’t go into taking us somewhere, it’ll rip reality like a freaking napkin!”

“I-I can’t! I don’t know if it’s safe! I can’t go there!”

Stan didn’t have time to ask where _there_ was. “It’ll be fine. I promise. Let’s go! Let’s go!” He held out his hand.

The man visibly steadied himself. He took a deep breath and nodded. Good. As more stone rained from the ceiling, they jumped into the whirlpool of light.

The wind knocked out Stan’s breath. It was like getting caught under a huge wave. The light threw them around like kites in a hurricane. It was all Stan could do to keep hold of the man’s forearm. He could feel the man’s grip tight on his own arm. They could do nothing but ride it out and hope they got there with all their limbs. The trip seemed to last forever, but it couldn’t have been more than a few seconds.

It spit them into hot dirt. Stanley skidded across the ground and landed in an attempt at a roll. He ended up curled in a ball on his side. His stomach lurched. Sitting up, he gagged, arms trembling to hold up his weight, but he didn’t throw up. He’d take what he could get. Wiping his face, Stanley shut his eyes in hopes that it would calm his swimming head. A slip and a jump within five minutes. Bad, bad idea. He was not having a good time.

If the hacking and coughing from his left were any proof, his companion wasn’t faring much better. Stan pressed his thumb beneath his eye twice, and his vision circuited out completely. 

**Rebooting,** said a robotic voice that sounded like it was coming from inside his head (though really it was in the eye). An awful second passed. There was always this moment, right before his vision returned when he wondered if it wouldn’t work. He’d end up blind for good. But, like it did every time, the electronics lined up with his working eye, and the world came into sharp clarity.

Stan rubbed his head with a groan. The suns beat down on his back, and Stan pushed himself away from the dust. They’d landed in the middle of a red desert road. In the distance, massive red plateaus broke the horizon. The nearest cliffside, a good hour walk away, Stan would guess, was a familiar sight. The gates of Dune city, carved into a hollowed mountain, were impressive in themselves, and you couldn’t even see the city from here. He made it! Ha! And, there was his car down the road! It was a lucky thing it had been on autopilot.

Stan didn’t want to turn around. He wanted to stay just like this and take a nap or, if not a nap, he wanted to get up and run out of here without looking back.

Neither option was gonna work.

“Am I dead?” the man said from behind Stan. “Oh dear, I feel dead…”

Stan turned around and got his first good look at the man he’d saved. He was kneeling in the dirt, his glasses cracked and crooked, and his hair stuck up in tufts. His skin was an unhealthy pale, and he was thinner than Stan had ever seen him. But there was no denying it.

Ford Pines met Stan’s eyes, and he did a physical double-take, mouth falling open in clear confusion as he fumbled for his glasses. Stan didn’t blame him. It took Ford a second to find his voice. “ _Stanley_?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! Hope you’re enjoying so far! If you like, leave a review! I’d really appreciate it!


	3. Rocket Man

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey guys!! you all seem to be really liking this, and I'm so glad! Thank you for the kind reviews from the bottom of my heart!

“Y-yeah,” Stanley stuttered, unfortunately. He did not expect the day to go this way. Though, he couldn’t exactly fault himself in that regard. Seeing his brother again had always been a background dream, a horrid little nightmare he tortured himself with sometimes. It wasn’t something that reasonably should _happen,_ and yet, here they were. “You look, uh, awful.”

Ford stared at him.

“... Oookay. You’re welcome for saving your life.” Stan started to get to his feet, but Ford scrambled forward and grabbed his arm. Startled, Stan jerked back, which only succeeded in pulling Ford to his feet. Ford swayed unsteadily on his feet. There was something about his face that _deeply_ disturbed Stan- something feral and terrified. His fingers dug into Stan’s arm.

“You got my message! I-I thought you didn’t.”

“... Uh.” Well, now this was awkward. Stan wrestled his arm away from Ford. “No, I didn’t get any message- hey, calm down, will you!” He pushed him back.

Ford backed up a step, only to lose his balance. So Stan grabbed hold of him again, shifting so he was supporting most of Ford’s weight. “Are you hurt? What’s going on?”

“No…” Ford’s eyes zipped around Stan’s face. “how did you get into the basement?” He looked around, for the first time, apparently, and his eyes widened. “Where are we? What’s happening _?_ ”

Right. Stan started walking them toward his car. “Dimension 8-BFD.” Wait- Wait! A wave of panic rushed through him, and he fumbled for his pocket. His hand met with the edges of the black box, and Stan relaxed. He still had the hourglass, thank the stars.

“BFD?”

“Big Effin' dessert.”

Ford looked around them as they walked. Or, Stan walked, and Ford sort of stumbled along. “I suppose… it’s accurate.”

“It’s the official name.”

Stan flicked his wrist as they neared the car, and the door eased open. Ford being here was a bit of a twist in the plan... but he could work with it. Sure. Yeah. This was all fine. He just needed to not think about it too hard. When they reached the car, Ford pushed away. He stared at the Stanmobile, back at Stan, and then up, at the twin suns above. “There is nothing about this I understand.” He scrubbed his face with his hands. “I’m dead. I have to be. Good grief, how could I not see it? This is some- some sort of delusion brought on by the last firing of my neurons… how else would _you_ be here?”

Stan wasn’t sure how to respond to that, so he didn’t. Ford sat in the sand in the shadow cast by the car and Stan, after a moment of hesitation, slowly sat down as well. It wasn’t like he wasn’t on a _very tight schedule_ or anything… “Why is that more believable than the crappiest trans-universal portal in the multiverse spitting us into another dimension? That’s what a portal does. That’s the only thing it does.”

“Because you’re here!”

“Yeah! It’s weird! I agree!”

Ford’s mouth dropped open and then closed again, he turned to stare at the horizon, his lips pursed. “I refuse to speak to you, illusion.”

“You’ve gotta be kidding me. I’m not- Ford! Stop it, look at me- stars, you are just as stubborn as I remember- FORD! Can an illusion do this?” Stan kicked him. He wasn’t close enough to punch. He didn’t kick very hard, and yet, Ford gasped and nearly fell back, and this eased Stan’s ire. It didn’t matter if Ford thought he was an illusion. Something bad, probably several bad things, had clearly happened to him. Stan was suddenly swamped in memories he hadn’t thought about in years. He remembered picking glass out of Ford’s palms, hiding the crushed frames of his glasses from their father. He remembered Ford coming home with bruises whenever Stan didn’t walk with him and how crappy Stan felt if he ever got in detention because that meant Ford walked home alone or Ford waited until Stan could walk with him, and in both cases, the boys usually found him and it was all just… kids are horrible creatures. People put it down to immaturity and impulse control, but that wasn’t it. People sucked and they sucked worse when they could get away with it. Their whole middle school/high school had been… awful. And here they were again. This was too much. He’d put it behind him. Stan was going to be sick. His entire body was shaking. If he kind of just jittered his leg, he could control it.

The kick seemed to do the trick, and Ford stopped staring at nothing, instead gaping at Stan as if he’d just grown a pair of antlers. “You’re dead. Mom couldn’t get a hold of you. She said- we all thought- I mean, I hoped, but when you didn’t respond to the postcard, I figured for sure-”

“Obviously, you were wrong,” Stan spat. “It’s a long story.” Something painful was curdling in his chest. He cleared his throat and unzipped his backpack. They didn’t have time to sit in the desert. He needed to get rid of the box. “Here.” Stan searched through his bag and grabbed a protein bar and the water bottle. He pushed the food and water into Ford’s hands and got him to his feet. They were safer on the move. He led him to the passenger side of the car. Holding the bar like it was something alien, which, okay, it was, Ford folded into the car robotically. 

“Eat it,” said Stan. “You’ll feel better. You’re like a friggin skeleton.” Stan shut the door, got into the car on the driver’s side, and started onto the road.

For a long moment, neither of them said anything, and Stan mentally ran through a brief series of horrible things that could happen at any moment now that Ford was out here, driving toward one of the most dangerous cities in the multiverse. Failed-PE Stanford Pines. Kicked-out-of-boxing Stanford Pines. Can’t-lie-to-save-his-life Stanford Pines. Crap, Stan was sweating now. Taking him along was such a bad idea, but he couldn’t _leave him._ Maybe Ford could just stay in the car. Stan would do his thing, and then he’d take them somewhere calm where Ford could recover from… whatever, and Stan could figure out what to do next.

The blinking lights of the car’s computers seemed to bring Ford back to himself and he poked at the center council screen in interest, eyes widening at the touch screen, and then going even wider when he activated the holographic controls. “How...”

“I got it all fixed up outside of the Greulin quadrant back in, oh, it musta been at least five years ago now. Don’t touch that! It’ll open up the wings.”

“ _Wings?_ ” Ford croaked.

“Eat the bar. You’re freaking out.”

“Hunger is _not_ why I’m freaking out, Stanley!”

Fair enough. Stanley opened his hands against the wheel. “Whatever. Starve, then.”

With a huff, Ford curled a little in on himself. He took a bite of the bar. “What is this?” he said through a mouthful.

“Protein bar?”

“Is it supposed to glow?” The bar was indeed glowing a soft pink. Stan wasn’t sure why they did that. Ford tried to decipher the wrapper, but obviously, it was in All Speak, which Ford didn’t know. He scowled at the swirling symbols. “What’s it made of?”

“I’m not a friggin chef, Ford. It’s edible, okay? I eat them all the time.”

“Tastes like blueberries.”

Someone save him. Fifteen minutes, and Stan was already prepared to throw his entire brother out of the car.

Fortunately for Ford, the city was getting closer. They passed under the shadow, a huge blanket of a thing that stretched far from the actual gate and dropped the temperature a good ten degrees. There were people on the outskirts of the city. They’d set up colorful tents and parked their cars, or they were stopped in a line at the gate. The vehicles were numerous and shaped with such variety it looked more like a parade of floats than a line of traffic. The people driving were just as unusual as their vehicles. Stan caught sight of a pair of tall, reptilian people with yellow eyes, slitted snouts, and weird clown shoes. There were a few Newpts. They looked like furry gumdrops about the size of Stan’s fist, and they had a wide mouth full of teeth, hidden beneath the puff. In the car in front of Stan, there was a humanoid. Humanoid, as in, they looked like they could be human. He had little to no way of knowing if they were _actually_ human. Humans were pretty rare in the multiverse since most Earths hadn’t managed large-scale space travel, much less interdimensional travel.

Ford made a noise like a gasp and a squeak. Was he going to faint? “What is that?”

Stan leaned forward so he could see what Ford was pointing at. On the left, not in a car, but in line for the city, as far as Stan could tell, there was a Gashadokuro. It towered fifteen feet above everything else, even seated. They were often mistaken for giant skeletons, but they were just pale-colored crustaceans, and they were a quite friendly bunch, though solitary in nature. They lived in caves on a desolate, snowy planet. This one was letting a pair of young neon-yellow children play on their hand, a sort of bemused look on their face (though, to be fair, they always looked bemused.)

Stan smiled. “A Gashadokuro! Haven't seen one of those since d-68b! Met a real nice lady. We did try to… you know, but it wasn’t, I mean, _clearly,_ it wasn’t gonna work out.”

“I did not want to know that.”

“You asked me!”

“About them! _Gashadokuro_ , you said?” For the first time, something that wasn’t exhaustion or terror lit up Ford’s eyes. He reached into his coat as if to grab something, only to pause and place his hands on his knees. “... what do you know about them? _Besides_ -”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it. Uh, the one I met really liked placing bets. They go ta those horse race things all the time.”

“Really?”

“Uh-huh. They wear fancy hats and everything.”

Ford sat back and fixed his glasses. He looked very much like he wanted to talk, but he didn’t. Instead, his lips moved while he clearly talked to himself. Weird creatures were still his thing, Stan supposed. What did he end up studying in school? Stan had figured he’d go on and do some ‘serious’ science thing.

This got Stan thinking, again. He’d almost forgotten in the whole shock of finding Ford. “Ford, what was that thing in the cave?”

Ford stiffened. He didn’t take his eyes off the creature while they eased closer to the gate. “It was in the basement, actually.”

“That’s worse, actually. Why did ya have a portal in your basement?”

Only now, Ford’s eyes slid from the Gashadokuro. He gave Stan a steady, guarded look. “It's a long story,” he said, in a mock of Stan’s accent. It was a clear challenge. ‘Two can play this game’ he was saying. Stan hadn’t told Ford anything either.

“You almost destroyed that entire dimension.”

“Hmm,” said Ford. “I didn’t.”

“Ha! Barely! Come on.”

Ford debated for a second. “I built it.”

Stan slammed the breaks. “You _did not._ ”

“I did!”

“I’m not fricking stupid. Even if you had the parts… You could give a caveman all the parts and he’s not going to make an atomic bomb. He doesn’t even know atoms exist! It’s not possible!” Someone honked at Stan, and Stan kept driving with a choice cuss.

Ford, of course, opted to not address Stan’s statement. He crossed his arms and looked out the window. “What makes you such an expert?”

“Oh I don’t know, maybe the interdimensional travel I've been doing for the last _decade._ I don’t know how the portals work exactly. Heck, I don’t know how a telephone works either, but I sure know more about it than a caveman.”

“I have _twelve_ Ph.D.’s Stan. I am hardly a caveman.”

They were not going to have this argument. No. Clearly, something else happened. Ford must have found it, or… or something (but why would someone build a portal in such a backwater dimension anyway?). Stan’s hands tightened on the wheel. “Fine. You built it. Whatever.”

They were three cars from the guards at the base of the gate now. The cliff loomed over them. It was so tall, Stan would have had to stick his head out the window to see the sky. At the gate, the guard, a burly humanoid, waved the Gashadokuro toward an appropriately sized door.

“You have access to a portal?” Ford said.

“Not one like _that_ thing. Portals are supposed to be real quick things. Like takin’ a picture. My, uh…” Stan actually didn’t know what to call Bill. He hadn’t been working for him for ages, and they weren’t actively trying to kill each other. So, not friends, not enemies, not strangers either. “An associate of mine hooked me up with the materials for a portal gun.” He pointed at the series of buttons on the car screen. “They’re very rare, but they exist.”

“And that’s how you got into the basement.”

“Um, no, not exactly.”

But Ford wasn’t listening. His brow was furrowed like he’d encountered a tricky problem. He wouldn’t look at Stan anymore. “How did you end up out here anyhow? You have a portal… and you never came back?“

Oh.

Was it hot in here or was that just him? Stan swallowed, hard. “It’s complicated.” Ford huffed, and, grace be to the gods that be, the guard rapped on Stan’s window. Stan didn’t think he’d ever been so grateful to see a government official in his life. He smacked Ford’s shoulder to make sure he was paying attention. “ Just follow my lead. I’ll do the talking.”

Ford didn’t say anything, which Stan could work with. He rolled the window down and flashed the officer a bright smile.

A few moments later, after showing one of Stan’s many fake IDs, the great metal bars of the gate eased open, and Stan and Ford passed once more from shadow into light. There had been a moment of worry, where the guard squinted at Stan. “Have I seen you before?”

“I don’t think so.”

The guard looked Stan up and down, and then shrugged. 

The sun glinted off the white square buildings with edges soft and carved from the stone almost lovingly. The city was built in a bowl-shape inside the hollow cliff. The buildings climbed to dizzying heights with no real sense of organization. Criss-crossing the road, blotches of color on clotheslines dotted the sky. The streets bustled with hundreds of people going about their business along Dune City's main street.

Stan actually really liked it here. They had really good pastry shops. If it wasn’t for the rampant crime, socially-accepted slavery, and the god-awful heat, he might have considered staying for a bit. But Dune City wasn’t the sort of place a person stayed unless they were stuck.

“Do you live here?” Ford asked.

“No. I have an errand I have to run real quick, and then I’ll get us somewhere safe so we can figure out what I’m going to do with you.” Ford bristled, but Stan plowed on before he could protest. “You’re going to stay in the car. These people aren’t nice, and they don’t know I have a brother. I don’t want to spook them.”

“... is this an illegal errand?”

“Uh, probably. I didn’t check. Once I get paid, I’m going to be set for,” He blew a raspberry. “a good while, anyway.” If he _didn’t_ get rid of it, he was probably going to end up very dead, but Ford didn’t need to know that. Stan risked a glance at Ford. Predictably, he was sitting stiffly, jaw tight. But he didn’t try to talk Stan out of it, which was good enough.

They weaved through the streets, up several levels until you could look out the window and be met with a thirty-foot drop a few inches from the edge of the road. Stan had been here before. He knew his way around. He parked down the street from a rather impressive shop. At its essence, it was a pawn shop, but Stan would have gotten his hands cut off if he dared insinuate that ‘this institution’ was anything so base. Well-dressed customers walked the streets with elaborate hairdos, and people ate their lunches out on the sidewalks in front of fancy restaurants. When Stan parked, he caught the eye of a brown-haired woman in a group across the street, and he winked at her. He was feeling good about the situation at large.

“Are you sure about this?”

“Don’t worry about it, Ford. Jasper's is a ‘respectable institution.’ The worst they can do is kick me out.”

Ford didn’t relax. Heck, Stan didn’t exactly need his permission. This was the best thing he could do for the both of them. The longer he kept the box, the longer they were in danger. So if it made Ford uncomfortable, well, he was going to just have to deal with it.

Shouldering his bag, Stan opened the door. “Stay in the car.”

“I _know._ ”

“Uh, huh.” Stan shut the door and made his way toward ‘Jasper’s Paraphernalia’ with a skip to his step. Stopping before the frosted glass door, he knocked in the particular way he was supposed to knock, and the door eased open immediately. All according to the plan.

As he disappeared into the shop, Ford’s eyes were on the back of his head, but he was not the only one.

Sitting at a small pastry shop with good Ethernet reviews, a young woman idly petted the cat on her lap. She flicked off the holographic display in her glasses and cocked her head, a satisfied smile crossing her lips. “I _told_ you this city was a good idea, mittens.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ah hah


End file.
